Coast to Coast 2021: Velas to Jaitapur

The first thing I did before the start of the day was to ensure that the chain was cleaned properly and lubed. It was still dark and I had to use my external torch for that. The members of the family were still sleeping. The activity lasted for about 15-20 mins following which I started to mount the luggage on the back. Dawn was about to break up.

I promised myself to leave by 7 am after having tea. I made up my mind to try to reach Goa. I took the phone number of the homestay for the future use.

It was way early in the morning. The cold was there and I was breathing the fresh coastal air. There was only a single road to follow along the coast and all the places to be ‘passed’ were noted down in my atlas copy for today.

The first village which I was going to encounter was Kelshi. We had been to this place for beach camping back in 2017. The route from Velas to Kelshi was complete offroad and I passed through many small villages along the way. The distance to Keshi was roughly around 20 km.

The soil has a large amount of Iron content in it and thus the red appearance of the soil. Back in 2017, while arriving at Kelshi, we encountered many heavy trucks carrying loads of mined soil only to be carried to the iron industry and as a result, we had to suffer a lot due to heavy dust being blown away by passing trucks. It was really a nightmare faced by us at that time but today, the route was calm and somehow I came to know (read somewhere in newspaperer) that the mining had been stopped owing to some illegal activities being carried out.

‘Kelshi’ was still sleeping when I arrived. Hardly, anyone was out of their homes. Shops were seen closed and the sun by now had come up nicely, its rays hitting me head-on!

Disaster struck soon after I had crossed ‘Padale’ village. The main right side mirror gave up. The welding had broken. I guess due to excessive vibration owing to bad roads. It was the main lifeline and now I was literally handicapped. I am used to regularly seeing in the rear-view mirror. Now, I had to be more careful while overtaking. It was not a major problem for me as I was on the coastal roads with hardly any major traffic and errant drivers.

With the kind of road I was driving, it seemed difficult to find a good mechanic/welder at this point in time who would possibly help me with a temporary fix. Even finding one in ‘Anjarle’ was a dead end.

It was good to see the lives of the coastal people going by their daily chores. The ‘Harne’ village was bustling with activities as I was passing through.

Crossing Harne village, I passed through Saldura, Karde, and Tamastirth villages before arriving at my first Jetty boat place at Dabhol. The ‘Karde’ beach was quite spectacular with roads almost kissing the sea and the good thing was that the place was not crowded with hotels. It offered the beautiful virgin view of how an ideal beach view should be.

The Ferry was not available at the moment and I had to wait for some time for it to arrive. The waiting time was spent eating some snacks which I took from the shop nearby. It was around 11 am and I had not eaten since leaving ‘Velas’.

After waiting for some 20min, finally, the ferry arrived and I hopped onto it immediately. Just after crossing, I could see many breakfast joints and so I decided to have breakfast immediately. The breakfast consisted of Steaming hot ‘Wada Pav’ (Potato patties and Bread) along with Tea.

The next village which came immediately was “Anjanvel’. It was at Anjanvel that I completed my first 100kms for the day starting from Velas around 7 am. It took me more than 5 hrs to cover. The speed had been very slow. This was an indicator of how much more distance I would be covering and eventually reaching a suitable place before the sun went down. I projected around 120 km of more riding for today.

Guhagar came quickly and when I reached the city, I had to stop and ask for directions from locals. By now, the humidity had increased and I could feel it whenever I stopped. The next village on the route was Velaneshwar which was around 17 kms.

Soon, I would be taking my 2nd ferry boat of the day. It was from Tavasal village which was around 15 km when I crossed a board mentioning the name. The time was past noon now.

The time spent on the ferry boat was relaxing. It helped my body to get some rest while at the same time hydrating myself. Also, the feeling and experience on the jetty were like kind of crossing big oceans on an Overlanding trip.

The time was around 1 pm and now I was heading towards Ganpatipule city.

Along the way, I decided to stop and hydrate myself with tender coconut and Garcinia juice which has cooling properties. It was a reliever in the scorching heat.

By now, since the start of the journey, I had already covered more than 4000 km and as I was completely riding on the coastal roads, the Royal Enfield service center was hard to get by. With ‘Ratnagiri’ coming up on the map, I gave a call to my friend who works in Royal Enfield to arrange for a quick Engine Oil change on the bike as it was a weekly off in Ratnagiri. Monday is the industrial off in Ratnagiri. What a perfect coincidence!

Luckily, I got the number of the service manager from my friend and he told me that the service had been arranged even though it was a holiday for the service staff. I coordinated with the service manager for the directions to the place. Within 15 minutes, I was at the place and offloading all the luggage from the bike and readying the bike for its first service of the trip.

I had to wait for quite some time as the service technician who was going to do the service was on his way. He traveled from more than 20kms just to service my bike on a holiday. What a great gesture by the Ratnagiri RE team! They got to know about my trip and gave their all in preparing the bike for the next leg.

The right mirror was still a problem and the issue was lingering. Putting a stock new mirror was not the option, since I had increased the height of the mirror with a custom spacer. I needed the exact height so as to get a clear rearview. The only option was to weld it and since it was an industrial off, I tried my best to locate a shop nearby. Luck, this time, was on my side as I found a welding shop just walking distance from the RE service center.

After the service was done, I thanked all the members of the service team and told them they had really gone out of their way to support me on this journey. We took a group photo and I went directly to the welding shed.

The service team also helped me with a used right mirror that was lying in their scrap yard. That was needed to fix the existing mirror as I was going to use some portion of it to fix my original mirror.

He was only 18 yrs old and he was working this job. The boy looked like he had already mastered the art of welding. It was an impeccable job and I was super happy. Help can come in any form. You just can’t imagine it. Never knew a small boy would add so much on this trip.

Finally, I left the place around 5:15 pm. I knew I only had around an hour of riding left. I had not thought of a place to break for today. I planned to ride till dark. The next village on the line was ‘Pawas’

It started to drizzle as the sun was going down and it added a bit of coldness to the atmosphere which was the need of the hour. I felt like the rainy season was still ON even in the month of February.

At around 7:15 pm, I reached a junction that I thought was ‘Jaitapur’. The Auto drivers nearby confirmed that I was right. Help was taken from them to locate a good hotel nearby for my stay. They tried calling few hotel owners which they knew but the quoted rate was too high for my budget. I was looking in the range of 500-600rs. They told me in the range of 1300-1500rs.

After much time had been passed and the drivers seeing me helpless at this point of the hour, one of them stepped forward and offered me a place at his own house to stay for the night. It was a small kindergarten school located in his house premises where I was going to stay. I had no words to say for this helpful gesture.

He called his son to escort me to their house which was not far away from our place. After few minutes, the boy arrived and I happily followed him with a relaxed face.

The kindergarten room was enough for me for a single night. I really thanked them again for showing a kind gesture towards me. They even provided me with a mattress and cover for sleeping. I off-loaded all my luggage into the room and got freshened up. I put on all the electronic devices for charging and got along checking all my day’s messages on phone.

After around an hour, they called me to have dinner in the house. It was my first time having a home-cooked dinner in coastal Maharashtra. Never knew that it was going to happen this way. Best things always happen when things go unplanned. They had a joint family and I interacted with all of them while all of us were watching daily Marathi soaps.

After dinner, I said goodbye to all of them and thanked them for serving me a tasty dinner. I told them that I was tired and needed rest and took their leave. I returned to my room and crashed immediately.

Another surprising day awaited me tomorrow. I was all excited about the way things had been for today.